Despite
recent high-profile visits to ailing President Muhammadu
Buhari in
the United Kingdom, where for close to 90 days he has been undergoing treatment
for a grave illness, SaharaReporters has learned that the Nigerian president is
not as healthy as has been portrayed by members of his inner circle. Mr.
Buhari’s illness remains officially shrouded in secrecy, but sources close to
his inmost associates had long told this website that the president was beset
by cancer.
In recent
weeks, the cabal around Mr. Buhari has used a flurry of well-orchestrated
visits to the ailing president by political personages to sell a narrative of
“miraculous recovery.” But such rosy impressions are belied by a palpable
deterioration in President Buhari’s health, according to accounts offered by a
few sources knowledgeable about the Nigerian leader’s condition.
President
Buhari abruptly left Nigeria for the UK on May 7, 2017, arriving at Luton
airport in London. He immediately proceeded to a London hospital where
treatment had been set up prior to his arrival, said one of our sources.
According to that source, Mr. Buhari’s initial treatment was so grueling that
it left him devastated and weak, with severe difficulty speaking and eating.
For weeks
after his arrival in the UK, no political figure in Abuja heard from Mr. Buhari
either in person or via phone calls. In fact, for some time his aides with
direct access to him were reduced to just two, while the remainder of the
retinue that traveled with him was left in hotels in London, kept in the dark
about his health condition.
The
prolonged period during which Mr. Buhari was incommunicado fueled rumors that
he was completely incapacitated. Some members of the cabal around him, as well
as his wife, traveled to London in search of the president, but mostly came
back empty-handed.
The spell
was somewhat broken in late June when Mr. Buhari’s aides released an audio
recording of his Sallah greetings to Muslims celebrating Eid-el-Fitr. The
president’s message, spoken in a weary voice in Hausa, immediately drew
criticism from Nigerians who pointed to the fact that the message seemed to
ignore the significant portion of non-Hausa speaking Muslims in Nigeria.
Mr. Buhari’s
sign of life in his Sallah message seemed to energize members of his cabal to
start envisioning a future past his presidency. In Saudi Arabia, a major player
among the cabal, Isa Funtua, met with numerous political players, including
Senate President Bukola Saraki, whom he designated as the arrowhead of a
post-Buhari power arrangement.
A source
familiar with that meeting disclosed that Mr. Funtua proposed that, even if
Buhari were in a vegetative state, acting President Yemi Osinbajo should be
barred from becoming the substantive president. His fear was that an Osinbajo
presidency would alter the power equation for members of the cabal who believe
that power should remain in the north for eight years. Mr. Funtua reportedly
reminded the audience in Saudi Arabia that the last time an apparently “soft”
southerner, Goodluck Jonathan, was given power, he used state resources “to
marginalize the north.”
He described
Mr. Osinbajo as politically “stronger” and “wiser” than Mr. Jonathan,
especially because of his godfather, former Governor Ahmed Bola Tinubu, whom he
suggested should be completely neutralized because he was too ambitious and
politically strategic.
In a slight
deviation from the Funtua plan, the other half of the cabal led by the Chief of
Staff, Abba Kyari, was devising another agenda. The Kyari group would be open
to extracting a resignation letter from Mr. Buhari and accept Mr. Osinbajo’s
assumption of full presidential powers if the current acting President would
agree to pick Attorney General and Minister of
Justice,
Abubakar Malami, as his Vice President.
However, a
snag to the plan was that Mr. Malami and Mr. Osinbajo have pretty much parted
ways. Acting President Osinbajo has been directly coordinating justice-related
matters, even convening meetings related to the national prosecution committee
behind Mr. Malami’s back.
While the
cabal’s jostling was going on, Mrs. Buhari traveled to London to see her ailing
husband. A diplomat source said the First Lady rented an apartment in London
away from the “Abuja House” residence where her husband stays.
SaharaReporters
learnt that three or four days after her arrival in
London, Mrs.
Buhari was told to join her husband for dinner. The meeting turned out
heartwarming as Mr. Buhari reportedly managed to speak and to sit to eat with
her. After subsequently spending more time with her husband, Mrs. Buhari told
other family members that he was making “a miraculous recovery.” She then wrote
Facebook updates warning the “jackals and hyenas” based in Abuja that the “King
of the Animal Kingdom” would soon return and send them packing.
The same
day, the president’s daughter, Zarah, took to Twitter to claim that her father
was in great shape.
A few days
later, acting President Osinbajo snuck out of Abuja for a one-on-one meeting
with Mr. Buhari. On his return, he asserted that Mr. Buhari was in great shape,
was recovering quite fast and would soon be back.
Despite
those inflated claims, SaharaReporters learnt that the cabal was not quite
satisfied with Mr. Osinbajo’s body language as he relayed the message to
Nigerians. Some cabal insiders alleged that the acting President’s close aides
had leaked information to the media, especially SaharaReporters, that Mr.
Buhari was far from a picture of great shape.
SaharaReporters
learned that Mr. Osinbajo encountered a highly emaciated and feeble Buhari who
could not speak coherently. It was no surprise that the acting President did
not bring back with him any audio, video or photo of the meeting.
On July 23,
2017, a few days after Osibanjo returned, the cabal arranged a visit by
handpicked party leaders of the All Progressives Congress (APC). Led by Odigie
Oyegun, the visiting party included some governors and ministers. The meeting
managed to produce a single photo showing Buhari sitting at the edge of the
table, but without partaking in the feast.
The single
photo perhaps caused greater harm than was anticipated.
Almost
immediately, an announcement was made that seven governors of the APC as well
as others handpicked from the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) were to visit Mr.
Buhari in London on July 26, 2017. Led by Governor Rochas Okorocha of Imo
State, the governors gushed about Mr. Buhari’s recovery. They also claimed that
their meeting with him lasted almost an hour and that the president discussed
issues of national importance, a ploy to give the impression that he was
closely monitoring events at home.
A bunch of
photographs showed Mr. Buhari smiling. Even so, no single video or audio was
presented to Nigerians from all the visits. Nor could any of the visitors tell
when Mr. Buhari would return home.
Saharareporters
also learnt former President Olusegun Obasanjo also visited Buhari in London in
the company of former Osun state, Gov. Olagunsoye Oyinlola, although Obasanjo
is yet to make a public pronouncement on the trip.
Several
sources told SaharaReporters that the highly publicized visits were designed to
create the appearance that Mr. Buhari was regaining his health and was prepared
to resume in office.
Yet, our
sources revealed that Mr. Buhari’s ability to receive visitors was no
indication of improved health, but came after his completion of a course of treatment
that lasted three months. According to the source, since the completion of that
course of treatment, Mr. Buhari occasionally enjoys momentary relief. “He can
see people and sit for a little bit of time, but that does not mean he is
healed as his doctors are yet to conclude that he is free of the disease
afflicting him,” one of the sources said. They added that the President had not
regained his health and had lost so much weight that he is “padded” just before
his meetings with governors and politicians.
According to
the source, members of the cabal around Mr. Buhari were once again pressuring
him to return to Nigeria, his frail health notwithstanding. Should the cabal
win out again, they would simply use the president’s presence as a ruse to manipulate
policies and politics to serve their individual interests.
The
president’s doctors appear to have a different agenda. One of our sources
stated there was no plan by Mr. Buhari’s doctors to let him travel to Nigeria
in the near future.
“They [doctors]
have asked that Mr. President should stay in the UK for another period of
monitoring and round of treatment that could last weeks if not months.”
SaharaReporters
had revealed that the cabal behind Mr. Buhari was considering claiming that the
president was embarking on his vacation after close to three months of
treatment during this particular trip. Prior to the current medical trip,
President Buhari had spent close to 50 days in London between December and
February.
One of our
sources, briefed by one of the governors who recently saw Mr. Buhari, revealed
that the ailing president “is only okay a few hours some days. And it takes a
lot of work to prepare him for meeting people.”
Another
source drew attention to Mr. Buhari’s look during his recent meeting with the
Archbishop of Canterbury, Justin Welby, adding that the president seemed a
shadow of his former self.
One source
said Mrs. Buhari had earlier been told her husband would be able to return with
her to Nigeria last Wednesday, only to find out he was in no shape for the
trip. She quietly left London alone and appeared in Imo State last Thursday for
an event.
Placed in a
desperate situation, the cabal has claimed that Mr. Buhari was waiting to
regain some weight before returning to resume work. But after two previous
occasions when the president was hurriedly flown into Nigeria, only to return
to the UK for urgent care, there appears to be a sobering sense among some
members of the cabal that their incessant game may be losing its efficacy.
According to one source, “The only people who can give a trustworthy update on
President Buhari’s real health status are his doctors, not politicians.”
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